OpenCode vs Cursor: what developers actually say
Based on 1,546 opinions on Hacker News from developers who discussed these two, most of them first-hand users.
OpenCode comes out ahead overall, with 66 approval vs 55, recent approval 55 vs 53, and 2 of 3 explicit head-to-head picks. Cost and limits favor it clearly: cost mentions are 113 positive to 24 negative vs 58 to 60 for Cursor, usage limits 35 to 8 vs 17 to 20, and customization 83 to 8 vs 21 to 9. UX is close at 95 to 47 vs 101 to 59, and reliability is equally negative at minus 44 for both. Cursor is the better pick for an IDE workflow, for speed (44 positive to 8 negative), and has a slight code-quality edge (59 positive to 49 negative vs 19 to 17).
When developers explicitly said they prefer one or switched: 2 picked OpenCode, 1 picked Cursor.
Choose OpenCode if
- Want much stronger cost and usage-limit sentiment
- Value customization and open-source control
- Prefer a terminal agent over an IDE
Choose Cursor if
- Want an IDE workflow
- Care about speed
- Want one interface for multiple agents
Where each one wins and loses
Why developers switched
Picked OpenCode
Picked Cursor
Summaries are paraphrased. Each links to the original comment.